


between the lines

by ataxophilia



Category: Elementary (TV)
Genre: Comfort, Friendship, Gen, joan helping sherlock deal with irene
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2014-03-21
Updated: 2014-03-21
Packaged: 2018-01-16 13:03:21
Rating: Not Rated
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 862
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/1348450
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/ataxophilia/pseuds/ataxophilia
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>"I’m not sad," he interrupts, a second finger joining the drumming. He glances across at her again, a rueful smile tugging at his lips. "I’m not, Watson," he says, as though sadness is a state of being, temporary, shakeable, rather than a constant, a hollowness inside of him that he can never quite fill.</p>
            </blockquote>





	between the lines

**Author's Note:**

> The Joan/Sherlock friendship means everything to me. 
> 
> Unbeta'd.

It’s telling, Joan thinks, that Sherlock doesn’t say anything about her entrance to the roof until she’s standing right behind him, saying, “It figures, that you’d be up here.”

His fingers are tight enough around the arms of his deckchair that his knuckles are a bloodless white. Joan’s seen that kind of tension countless times before, on fresh-out-of-rehab clients, and before that on the families of patients under her knife. It screams of hands being held in the same position for longer than is healthy, and that doesn’t fit with what she’s seen of Sherlock so far, the restless energy that always seems to be spilling out of the edges of him like he can’t expend it fast enough.

Today was always going to be rough, she’s known that for a while now, has watched Sherlock work himself through various stages of preparation over the last few weeks. Somehow, this stillness feels both anticlimactic and worse than anything she’s imagined.

"Watson," Sherlock replies, looking over his shoulder to squint at her before nodding to the mug in her hand. "I don’t suppose that’s for me."

Joan has seen Sherlock lie many times, to many people, in many different situations, but his voice has never sounded as flattened by the falseness as it does now. A part of her - the part that went into medicine to help people, the part that swelled with pride when a recovering addict walked away from her a little less broken by their addiction - wants to hand over the drink. The rest of her knows that it wouldn’t help to coddle Sherlock, just like it doesn’t help to pander to his sulks and tantrums on any other day. You don’t beat Sherlock by giving in to him.

She tells him, “If you want tea, make it yourself,” and sits in the second deckchair, the one with striped cushions that bring out the colour in her eyes. She knows they do because Sherlock told her so, after buying them and leaving them out for her.

Sherlock does subtlety like Sherlock does most things - with expertise, or not at all.

The smile he gives her at that is a little more real, and Joan gets the distinct feeling she just passed a test. “Of course,” he says, and one finger twitches, taps out a rhythm on the arm of the chair. Joan hides her smile in her mug, but she’s sure he sees it anyway.

"Sherlock," Joan starts, because she feels like they should talk, even if she’s not quite sure why, or how to broach the subject, or what, specifically, they should talk about. It’s how she fixes things, now that she doesn’t trust her fingers quite so much. It’s how they fix things, now that Sherlock trusts her a little more.

"I’m not sad," he interrupts, a second finger joining the drumming. He glances across at her again, a rueful smile tugging at his lips. "I’m not, Watson," he says, as though sadness is a state of being, temporary, shakeable, rather than a constant, a hollowness inside of him that he can never quite fill.

Joan knows he’s lying. He has sadness written in the lines of his shoulders, the hard edge to the smile he shoots at her like some kind of proof, the way his fingers have gone still again. And he knows that she knows. He taught her how to read the signs, after all.

When Joan stays pointedly silent, he takes a deep breath and turns to face her properly. “She died.” He pauses, moves his hands to smooth once down his jeans, and starts again. “Two years ago, a woman who did not exist died. There was a fake death, of a fake woman, and I- I believed it for a long time. I believed they were both real.” His fingers curl in on themselves until he’s digging two fists into his thighs. “I know now that I was wrong, and that no actual death took place on that day.” Another pause, before he adds, “Well, statistically speaking, many deaths took place that day, but not the one which you are concerned - incorrectly, Watson - that I am still mourning.”

"Sherlock," Joan tries again, and he pulls the same face a toddler pulls when they’re told it’s time to leave the park. It feels a little like they’ve regressed back to the first few months they spent together, when every step forward meant another door slammed shut in her face.

It stings more now that she considers Sherlock her closest friend, but it also makes more sense. Joan has learnt, through experience, that there are times when Sherlock needs to be pushed and times when Sherlock needs to be left alone, and how to differentiate between the two.

She leans forward, curls her hand around his, coaxes his fingers out of their fist and threads her own between them. “Okay,” she says, and it means - it means,  _I don’t believe you_ , it means,  _I’m here anyway_ , it means,  _I’m sorry she hurt you_ , it means,  _I won’t leave you_.

And when Sherlock spares her another sharp, sad smile, she knows it means,  _Thank you_.


End file.
